If everything goes according to plan (which is no sure thing, given the drama around our plane tickets…), I will be seeing Slowdive this Friday night in Madrid, Spain, closing out the second (but first for us) night of the Tomavistas festival. It will be the first time I’ve seen them since their last visit to Toronto in November 2017, but more interestingly, it will be almost eight years to the day (plus one day, to be precise), since I last got on a plane and jetted across the Atlantic to see them live.

That was May 19, 2014 at The Village Underground in London, and it would have been their very first reunion show and first gig in almost 20 years had it not been for a warm-up show at the Hoxton Square Bar a roughly 7 minute walk away the night before. And this will be their first show in over three years, save for another warm-up gig in Bath tonight. There’s some kind of weird almost-symmetry at play here.

In any case, that magnificent Village Underground show was recorded in full in decent amateur (read: cellphone) quality and shared online.